•i"-* S, No 59., Feb. 14. '67.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



137 



entasis ; few, I believe, are quite straight on the 

 sides ; mach of the beauty which is remarkable in 

 our best examples owe it to the skilful manner in 

 which the outline is defined by one or other of 

 these methods. Ben. Feebey. 



Great Tom of Westminster (2»1 S. iii. 69.) — 

 An engraving of this bell is given in the first vo- 

 lume of the Antiquarian Repertory, p. 11., edit. 

 1808 ; and in the second volume of the same 

 work there is the following account by an initial 

 writer : 



" The bell called Tom of Westminster hung in a strong 

 clock tower of stone, over against the great door of West- 

 minster Hall ; and about the beginning of the last cen- 

 tury was granted to St. Paul's, whither it was removed, 

 and stood under a shed in the churchyard many years 

 before the steeple was cleared of the scaffolding, and fitted 

 for such an ornament. The clock had not long been up 

 before the bell was cracked and new cast, but with such 

 bad success, that in a few years it was thought necessary 

 to take it down and repeat the experiment. 



" I mj'self was at the lowering of it, and lent a hand to 

 the breaking it in pieces, when an inscription on it, copied 

 from the old bell, engaged the attention of the company. 

 The form of the letters I cannot give ; the spelling is to the 

 best of my memory as follows : 



' Tercius aptavit me Rex, Edwardque vocavit, 

 Sancti decore Edwardi signaretur ut hore.' " 



The writer supposes that at the Reformation, 

 when the St. Edward (the Confessor) and his 

 hours ceased to be respected, this bell obtained 

 the name of Tom, as other large bells were called 

 from a fancy that when struck the sound was not 

 unlike the word. H. T. Eijoacombe. 



Clyst St. George. 



" Blind Maris Holiday" (1" S. v. 587. ; vi. 109.) 

 — As no satisfactory solution of this expression 

 has yet been given, may I suggest that it is a cor- 

 ruption of " blind vaaris all-day?" 'The meaning 

 then seems to be, that the gradual departure of 

 light has brought us to the state which the blind- 

 man endures all-day, or which is all the day the 

 blindman has. T. W. lis., M.A. 



ThanJis after Reading the Gospel (2°'^ S. ii. 467.) 

 — In the year 1853 I officiated for a few Sundays 

 at Elstead, in Surrey, and was greatly surprised, 

 when 1 had finished reading the Gospel, to hear 

 the parish clerk and the entire congregation repeat 

 together the words, " Thanks be to God for the 

 Gospel." I am confident that Mii. Eastwood will 

 find that the custom is still observed in many 

 nooks and corners in England. 



T. GiMtBTTE, Clk. 



Waterford. 



This custom, I remember, was observed some 

 years ago at Stokesley in Yorkshire. I have re- 

 marked that it still obtains in the more rural 

 parts of this county. Clebicus. 



Durham. 



Butts Family (2"" S. ii. 17. 478. ; iii. 16.) — A 

 family of considerable local eminence, bearing the 

 designation of But, Butt, Butte, or Butts, which 

 flourished in Norwich during the thirteenth and 

 following centuries, was probably connected with 

 that of the bishop, who, though himself a Suffolk 

 man, was descended from a younger branch of the 

 Norfolk (Thornage) Butts. The Norwich Butts 

 held lands and messuages there, previous to 4 E. I., 

 and several of their number were successively 

 bailiffs of the city, and its representatives in par- 

 liament. Alderman John Butt (Sheriff 1456, 

 Mayor 1462, 1471) is the last of the name of 

 whom we find mention in connexion with the 

 civic history of Norwich. He died in 1475, and 

 was buried in the chancel of the church of St. But- 

 tolph the Abbot, in Fybridge Gate, which church 

 was demolished in 1584. See Blomefield, passim. 



Wm. Matthews. 

 Cowgill. 



" God save the King" (2"'i S. ii. 96.) ~ I wish 

 to protest against Dr. Gauntlett's assertion that 

 " no doubt can exist that Dr. John Bull was the 

 composer of God save the King." I shall have 

 occasion to print my reasons for discrediting it, 

 but the argument would be too long for " N. & Q." 



Wm. Chappell. 



Weather Rules (P* S. passim.) — Mr. Meriara 

 of Brooklyn, New York, " who has devoted a life- 

 time to meteorological and atmospheric observa- 

 tions, has come to the conclusion that there is no 

 such thing as weather wisdom." The result of his 

 experience is thus told in his own words : 



" With all my practice and study in observing atmo- 

 spheric changes, and recording hour by hour, and daj' by 

 day, thermometrical and meteorological observations, and 

 in connexion with simultaneous observations made and 

 recorded elsewhere, I feel more and more convinced that 

 it is not in the power of any human being to determine 

 even a single day in advance, what changes will take 

 place in the atmosphere." 



w.w. 



Malta. 



Check or Cheque (2"^ S. ii. 377.) — In a former 

 Note I expressed an opinion that cheque is now 

 almost obsolete. I find, however, that in the 

 books delivered at the Bank to the depositors, 

 cheque is still preserved ; and this may be the case 

 with the bankers. Q. 



Bloomsbury. 



Deer Leap (2""^ S. iii. 47.) — Some few years 

 ago I attended the perambulation of a manor in 

 Devonshire. In the course of our proceedings 

 we came to one side of the manor, the boundary 

 of which, from time immemorial, was a deer's 

 leap from the visible and actual boundary, a bank 

 and wall, which separated the manor we were per- 

 ambulating from another, i.e. the rights of the ad- 

 joining manor extended a deer's leap into the one 

 we were perambulating. There were many con- 



